William Davies—Fossil Bird-remains of India. 19 
on Plate R. of the unpublished plates of the ‘Fauna Antiqua Siva- 
lensis’ on the evidence of these bones, M. A. Milne-Edwards! esta- 
blished two species of extinct Siwalik birds, namely, Struthio 
asiaticus and Argala Falconeri” (p.52). Further on he observes: “With 
regard to Struthio asiaticus of M. Milne-Edwards, it appears that this 
species was formed on the evidence of the phalange. and of the distal 
extremity of the tibio-tarsus, which are represented in figs. 2 and 15 
of the above-quoted plate;” and again, “Iam rather at a loss to 
discover how M. Milne-Edwards determined that his Siwalik ostrich 
had but two toes, because, as I have said, the only Struthioid bones 
figured in the ‘Fauna Antiqua Sivalensis’ are the distal extremity 
of the tibio-tarsus and a phalange” (p. 53). The species was, however, 
not founded upon these two bones, as Mr. Lydekker supposes ; for in 
a small collection of vertebrate remains obtained from the same 
locality, and presented to the British Museum, by the late Major 
Colvin, there is a distal end of a tarso-metatarsal of a two-toed bird, 
with the proximal half of the first phalange of the third toe in its 
natural position (PI. II. Fig. 1, ph.) ; and this, there can be no doubt, 
is the specimen which Prof. Alphonse Milne-Edwards refers to as the 
evidence for his Struthio asiaticus. Yet his note relating to it, which 
we here reproduce, is so short and indefinite, as to justify Mr. Lydek- 
ker’s conclusion. 
Milne-Edwards writes (op. cié. tom. il. p. 587) :— 
*T/une des espéces les plus remarquables appartenait an groupe 
des Brévipennes et se rapprochait beaucoup de PAutruche d’Afrique 
par la conformation de son pied, qui ne portait que deux doigts; 
mais elle était de plus petite taille que cette derniére: on pourrait, 
pour len distinguer, la nommer Struthio asiaticus.” 
This unique and important fragment is associated in the matrix 
with a series of twelve cervical vertebrae, and also with the bones of 
the wing, of probably the same bird; I say probably, because, occa- 
sionally in the Siwalik deposits, bones of more than one species of 
animal are found in juxtaposition, as in this very group, in which an 
incisor tooth and an atlas vertebra of a small ruminant are in contact 
with, and cemented by, the matrix inclosing the avian vertebre and 
metatarsal. 
The result of a careful comparison of the tarso-metatarsal and 
phalange, with the same bones of an adult and large African Ostrich 
(356 a), in the British Museum, is, that as regards form and size 
they are indistinguishable; although M. Alphonse Milne-Edwards 
supposed the fossil to have been inferior in size to the recent bird, 
and hence suggested a new specific name; but if we eliminate the 
conditions of occurrence and locality, the fragment possesses in 
itself no distinctive character by which it could be separated from 
the existing African Ostrich. And the annexed measurements, in 
inches and tenths, of the fossil and recent bones, will show how 
closely they assimilate in size. 
1 Oiseaux fossiles de la France, tom. i. p. 449, tom. ii. p. 587. 
